Hennessey Venom GT 0-300 km/h World Record Run

It isn’t often that great feats are achieved in the world of cars, especially when it comes to setting world records. In the case of John Hennessey of Hennessey Performance his dream was to make a supercar unlike any other and one that would not only rival the Bugatti Veyron, but decimate it. After five years of development and tens of thousands of dollars, the doors opened at Hennessey Performance and the Venom GT was unleashed to the world. This Lotus-looking supercar is essentially a stretched out Exige that has been reworked from the ground up thanks to material like carbon fiber and gold leaf. Add to that the heart of the beast is a Corvette ZR-1 engine (7.0-liter V8) that has been paired to twin Garrett turbochargers good for an estimated 1,244 horsepower!

So it is obvious that the Venom GT is agile and packs a punch harder than both the Koenigsegg Agera R and Bugatti Veyron, but how would it do in the benchmark test for a two-seat production car sprinting from 0 – 300 km/h? On January 10th, 2013 test driver John Kiewicz took the Venom GT into the history books. The setting was a fairly calm and dry day at the Ellington Airport near Houston, Texas. On hand was an official from the Guinness World Records along with a slew of technicians and Mr. John Hennessey himself. Without much delay, the car launched from a standing start to 300 km/h and back to 0 km/h in 2-way average time of 13.63-seconds!

To set the record straight with the disbelievers, the previous record set by the Koenigsegg Agera R was 17.68-seconds while the less “sporty” Bugatti Veyron nailed it down in 22.2-seconds. So is the record impressive? Absolutely! Not only is it now the fastest car in the world, but it smashed the previous record by nearly 4-seconds… a lifetime in the top speed run realm. The real question is, for the $1.2-million price tag for the high performance 1,200+ horsepower version – is it worth it? Unlike the Agera or Veyron you don’t get a history of craftsmanship and racing heritage, but you do get the ultimate form of bragging rights… that is until the next record is set.